Palace accepted Stoke Jedinak bid ‘out of respect’

Ian Watson
Mile Jedinak Crystal Palace TEAMtalk

Mile Jedinak: Palace captain back to full fitness

Alan Pardew insists Mile Jedinak has a future at Crystal Palace and says the club only accepted Stoke’s bid to be fair to the midfielder.

Jedinak was given permission to speak to the Potters on deadline day after a £3million deal had been agreed between the two clubs, but the move broke down over personal terms.

The Palace club captain will now resume the battle to regain his place from Yohan Cabaye, and manager Pardew is delighted the 31-year-old remains at Selhurst Park.

Pardew said: “Mile is a massive character and player for this football club.

“There was a bid accepted by the board here out of respect really.

“He’s a first-team player who’s not playing so I think it’s only fair to him that we’re honest when bids come in to give him the option.

“We gave him the option, but he’s here now to fight for his place. The decision was made by Mile to stay and we’re happy with that.”

Dwight Gayle has also been offered some encouragement by Pardew after Palace accepted an offer from Bristol City only for the striker to reject the move.

Pardew added: “With Glenn Murray leaving it gives Dwight an opportunity and he is now in the process of trying to take that.

“He’s trained very well, so Dwight’s very much a part of our family and hopefully we can give him more game time.

“The bid we accepted was before Glenn went. So we gave him the opportunity and another club was interested in him as well.

“But only one of them was going to go. I need a pool of strikers here and they need to fight it out.”